In addition to a theory of personality types, Theravada Buddhism psychology has a well-developed description of the underlying factors and dispositions that influence us. Some of this is the result of how past experiences can remain present throughout our lifetime. The combination of underlying mental factors and past conditioning come together to condition the appearance of what we sometimes call the “self”. On this afternoon, we identified the underlying mental factors and past experiences that contribute to our sense of self. We also discussed the impact these have on our personality structures. After identifying our own elaborate “Personality Type,” specific dhamma practices were identified to assist each individual to further develop the mind. Included in the discussion were:

Parāmi profile: 10 wholesome qualities of mind to be developed

Index of Potential Problems: the qualities of mind that most cause suffering

Introduction to Vajrayana Buddhism FOR THOSE UNFAMILIAR WITH IT—THEORY AND PRACTICE

In this daylong workshop, scholar-practitioner Rita M. Gross presented an introduction to Vajrayana – the form of Buddhism most strongly associated with the Buddhism of Tibet. The day was meant for those curious about this valuable form of Buddhism but know little about it. She explained both those aspects of Vajrayana Buddhism that most distinguish it from other forms of Buddhism and its underlying similarity with better-known forms of Buddhism. Regarding what is most distinctive about Vajrayana Buddhism, she explained some of its most common rituals involving visualization practices and mantra recitation. She also explained its deeper teachings about the nature of mind and reality that Vajrayana shares with other forms of Buddhism. Furthermore, she explained how the two major aspects of Vajrayana Buddhism, often called the “development stage” and the “completion stage,” are linked with each other and provide an overarching path to awakening.

While renunciation is commonly associated with Buddhist monastics, a growing number of Western lay practitioners are interested in how to live a nourishing life of lay renunciation. This daylong explored the possibilities, benefits, and challenges of renunciation in lay life.

The idea of lay renunciation raises such questions as:

What kinds of renunciation are most conducive to Dhamma practice as lay people?

What are the benefits and challenges of a lay life that honors the intention to let go?

How have dedicated lay practitioners lived in Asian cultures?

What teachings and practices can guide a lay person seeking to live a simpler, non-grasping frame of mind?

The day included a number of guest speakers, group discussion, and sitting practice. It provided an opportunity to learn and share ideas about the topic.

An important part of understanding Dharma is understanding what is not Dharma. A great deal of American not-Dharma—what passes for Dharma but actually isn’t—comes from the thought of the early German Romantics.

Even though their names are little-known in America, their ideas have had an enormous influence on Americans attitudes about spiritual life. When approaching the Dharma, we tend to view it in light of these attitudes, which in some ways are congruent with what the Buddha taught, and in many ways run directly counter to it. This daylong course—through talks, readings, and discussions—focused on understanding Romantic ideas about religious life and inspiration, the transmission of these ideas through American thinkers such as Emerson and James, their influence on modern American Dharma, and the ways in which this influence has seriously distorted our idea of what counts as Dharma and where Dharma practice leads.

The concept of a path of practice is one of the central features of the Buddha’s teaching. In addition to the well-known Eightfold Path, the Buddha described a number of other models of the Buddhist path to the end of suffering. These different models are useful descriptions that describe the path of practice through different perspectives. Join us as we explore and discuss three important paths of practice depicted in three different suttas from the Middle Length Discourses (Majjhima Nikāya, MN). We will study the “Gradual Training” from the Simile of the Elephant’s Footprint (MN 27), the “Discovery of Truth” from the Cankī sutta (MN 95) and the “Practice that Makes One an [Arahant]” from the Greater Discourse at Assapura (MN 39). In addition to studying the paths themselves, we will explore the context in which the Buddha taught them, and the contexts in which they may be useful for modern practitioners. The day will include lecture and small group discussion.

Diana Clark has a Master’s Degree in Buddhist Studies at the Institute of Buddhist Studies in Berkeley. She practices and occasionally teaches at IMC.

This workshop will explore ideas and experiences of emptiness. We’ll begin by considering Buddhist concepts of emptiness from early Buddhism through the later Mahayana and beyond. Then we’ll take a brief look at echoes of emptiness in later eastern and western philosophies and religions before examining emptiness in the work of contemporary artists and practitioners.

Central to the day will be investigation of our own experience and ideas of emptiness. Hopefully we’ll discover how emptiness is far from the quality of lack often ascribed to it, and how a such a transformed understanding may enrich our daily lives and well-being. The day will include teaching, discussion and sitting.

THE WOMEN AROUND THE BUDDHA: NEW PERSPECTIVES ON EARLY BUDDHIST HISTORY AND MODERN PRACTICE Presented by Rita M. Gross Early Buddhist history and the legendary lives of Siddartha Gautama are important for and fascinating to Buddhists of all orientations. However, in many accounts, the stories of the women central to the Buddha, especially his foster-mother and his wife, are obscured or forgotten. A great deal of Buddhist story-telling has grown to fill out our impressions about the lives of these women. We will focus especially on these stories in this daylong workshop. This focus will also allow us to explore how historical memories are created, the importance of creative story-telling to a living religious tradition, and changing ideas about gender in early Buddhism. The day will end with an exploration of how the implicit and explicit views of men and women appear in the stories and the practice of people practicing Buddhism in our modern world. Known as a warm, humorous and very clear teacher, Rita M. Gross teaches with a rare combination of academic and dharmic perspectives. She is internationally known for her innovative work on gender and religion. She also has extensive training and experience as a professor of comparative studies in religion and is a Buddhist Dharma teacher, appointed to that position by Her Eminence Jetsun Khandro Rinpoche.

The Brahmaviharas—attitudes of unlimited good will, compassion, empathetic joy, and equanimity—are useful tools for counteracting unskillful mind states, such as ill will and resentment, and for developing all three parts of the path to the end of suffering: virtue, concentration, and discernment. This day-long course will use readings, talks, discussions, and periods of meditation to explore the uses and limitations of these attitudes in the context of the total path.

Bhante Piyananda has hundreds of stories to illustrate the Dhamma. In this daylong class, he will share the Dhamma of Family and Lay Life drawn from the Buddha’s teachings and 58 years as a monk, teaching and supporting countless families and lay practitioners.

The Buddha's Teachings on Personal Practice and the Public Good with Gil Fronsdal and Diana Clark

The Buddha addressed the social, political, and economic challenges of his time through mythic stories containing lessons as relevant for us today as they were in his time.

During this day we will explore three discourses from the Long Discourses of the Buddha which discuss the role both government action and personal transformation have in the well-being of our society. In the background of our exploration will be exploring the uses of stories to convey spiritual teachings. The day will involve an interactive combination of lectures, discussion and creative engagement with the Kutadanta Sutta, the Cakkavatti-Sihanada Sutta, and the Agganna Sutta (Digha Nikaya 5, 26, and 27). These suttas can be found at http://tipitaka.wikia.com/wiki/Kutadanta_Sutta, http://tipitaka.wikia.com/wiki/Cakkavattisihanada_Sutta, and http://tipitaka.wikia.com/wiki/Agganna_Sutta.

What can science teach us about practice? This experiential workshop explores, through discussion, self-reflection, and meditation, insights into the process of cultivating self-compassion and compassion for others based on recent research on compassion training. Practices will include guided compassion meditations, gentle mindful movement, and simple breathing exercises

During this daylong we will be looking at short passages from the suttas to tell the story of the Buddha and to describe his essential teachings of the Dharma. A practical and experiential approach to sutta study will be given.

A one-day introduction to the richness of the Pali language and its potential for complementing and enriching one’s meditative practice and deepening one’s relationship to the Buddha’s teachings. While the dhamma in its 84,000 parts lies in the heart and not on any printed page, the Pali language has been and remains a potent vehicle for those who would make use of it. Its texts are not only the closest approximations to the Buddha’s teachings in their original formulations, but also the concrete vestiges of those who have most thoroughly realized those teachings within their own body, speech, and mind. The workshop will incorporate both scholarly and experiential approaches as we learn, recite, and imbibe the Buddha’s teachings in their original wording and attempt together to evoke their living meaning.

When discussing the sources of conflict—inner and outer—the Buddha pointed to a type of thinking he called papañca. This term is often translated as “conceptual proliferation,” but a survey of how it’s discussed in the Pali Canon shows that it has less to do with the amount of thinking and more with the way thinking is framed. This daylong course will focus on understanding what papañca is, how it happens, when it has its uses, and how the need for it can eventually be overcome.

During this daylong we will explore the spirit of the Buddha, characterized by kindness, creativity and questioning, through looking at discourses from the Pali Canon. We will use the prism of the eightfold path, as given in different suttas, to reflect on the path and develop it during the day. Together, we’ll cultivate some of the Buddhist meditation practices that were developed during and after the time of the Buddha. Through the use of such practices as questioning and mindfulness, we’ll reflect on each one of the eightfold paths to see what each means for us in our daily life.

Veneerable Analayo compares the three main insight traditions (Mahasi, Goenka, Pa Auk) and traces back similarities via the commentarial scheme of insight knowledges to a basic pattern of insight in the suttas.

Bhikkhu Analayo was born in Germany in 1962 and ordained in Sri Lanka in
1995. In the year 2000 he completed a Ph.D. thesis on the Satipatthana-sutta
at the University of Peradeniya (published by Windhorse in the UK). In the year
2007 he completed a habilitation research at the University of Marburg, in
which he compared the Majjhima-nikaya discourses with their Chinese,
Sanskrit, and Tibetan counterparts. At present, he is a member of the Centre for
Buddhist Studies, University of Hamburg, as a Privatdozent (the German
equivalent to an associate professorship), and works as a researcher at Dharma
Drum Buddhist College, Taiwan. Besides his academic activities, he regularly
teaches meditation in Sri Lanka.

In much contemporary Buddhist teachings, the paths of the heart are often relegated to second place behind the primacy of Wisdom on the path to awakening. In the earliest texts, however, the Buddha appears to consider the cultivation of kindness and compassion as a fully viable and equal path to awakening, to enlightenment, to Nibbana. This will be the premise of the morning’s discussion.

The Buddha did not teach in a vacuum. His teachings were directed to those who shared the social world in which he lived. John Peacock, a British scholar who studies and translates in more than a dozen languages and is familiar with the philosophical environment of the Buddha’s day, maintains that by framing the Buddha’s teachings in their original context, it is possible to recover the original meaning of teachings that have been ignored and lost by later Buddhist schools—including the Theravada. This weekend class will examine many of the ways in which Buddhist practice was radically different from the Brahmanical and Upanishadic thinking of the time and, indeed, how it differs in substantive ways from much present day understanding of the Dharma. The exploration will detail the Buddha’s shift away from metaphysical thinking to a focus on internal experience and ethical activity. In the process there will be consideration of how the Buddha’s earliest teachings diverge from much of the western philosophical tradition, and often from what has become the traditional view of the Dharma today as well.

The Buddha guided us to study human experience carefully in order to develop the wisdom that brings liberation from suffering, and manifests as lovingkindness and compassion toward other beings and their suffering. In the last half-century, this basic approach has been extended, through what has been called “socially engaged Buddhism,” to responses to social issues. Socially engaged Buddhism has been articulated and embodied, both in Asia and in the West, by teachers and leaders such as Thich Nhat Hanh, the Dalai Lama, Aung San Suu Kyi of Burma, Robert Aitken Roshi, and Joanna Macy. It has been expressed in a great variety of forms. Some have emphasized social service—working with those who are suffering or in need, developing compassionate programs and policies, bringing mindfulness into the workplace, or engaging in the helping professions. Others have connected their spiritual practice to attempts to end wars or oppression, change institutions, or address large-scale social, economic, political, cultural, or ecological issues. In this daylong, we combined periods of sitting and walking meditation with talks and discussion on four basic themes: (1) the roots of socially engaged Buddhism in the teachings of the Buddha, with a focus on those discourses relevant for social issues; (2) the history of socially engaged Buddhism, the forms that it has taken, and how it is both grounded in tradition and innovative (particularly in its connection with Western social justice traditions); (3) the nature of socially engaged Buddhist practices, how they might help constitute an engaged “path of practice” leading to both inner and outer liberation; and (4) some of the core issues and contemporary challenges related to socially engaged Buddhism.

The Buddha described only two of his teachings as categorical—i.e., as applicable across the board: the teaching on the four noble truths, and the teaching on the distinction between skillful and unskillful action. This second distinction is actually the more basic of the two, forming the framework for understanding all of this other teachings. This daylong workshop will focus on exploring the meaning of this distinction, its connection to the Buddha’s teachings on causality in general, and its implications for the practice: both on the cushion and in daily life.

Sutta Study: The Parinibbana Sutta: The Discourse On The Buddha's Last Day

One of the most important of the early Buddhist discourses is the one that narrates the last days of the Buddha's life. Knowing his death is approaching the Buddha gives some of his most significant and direct teachings.

The entirety of the Buddha's teaching is encapsulated in the first three discourses he delivered after his enlightenment. In this day of study we covered all three suttas in detail, exploring how they weave together to inform each other and create a complete description of Dharma teaching and practice.

During this class we studied the Brahmajala Sutta, the first discourse from the Digha Nikaya. In this profound discourse, the Buddha describes sixty-two speculative views about the nature of the self and the world. All these speculative views are shown to lead away from freedom; the Buddha points to the craving and agitation that underlie them. Finally, the Buddha teaches the way out of the net of speculative views through the development of wisdom. A translation of this sutta can be found online at: Access to Insight

Right Mindfulness and Right Concentration, together with Right Effort, form the concentration-aggregate of the noble eightfold path. Although these factors are often discussed separately, the Pali discourses show that the Buddha meant for them to form a unified practice. This course through talks, readings, discussions, and meditation explored what these factors means and how they can be brought together in a mutually supportive and nourishing way.

What does it mean to leave prison before you get out? What are the greater implications of teaching the experience of freedom not just as the other side of the gate but rather as a state of mind? This day-long training featured two dedicated professionals that aimed to share many years of service in the trenches of our prison system. The teaching addressed both specific questions related to Buddhist practice as well as how the dharma can be languaged and applied in practical ways to honor everyone's religious understanding. There was sharing of what language is conducive to teach meditation in prison, examples of exercises and discussion of prison related hindrances to practice. There was discussion on assembling a toolkit of useful applications of how the dharma informs violence prevention, skilful communication and conflict resolution. Paul Haller is a Zen Priest Co-Abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center. He was the head of Zen Center's outreach program and has spent many years teaching meditation in prisons. He is on faculty at the Zen Hospice Project and at the Sati Center for Buddhist Studies. Jacques Verduin is the founder and director of the Insight Prison Project, a non-profit that works in San Quentin State Prison. The project focuses on assisting prisoners in healing the pain that they lash out from by transforming the negative habit patterns that trip them up. IPP teaches 20 classes that serve 300 prisoners every week. Through its Insight Out Initiative trained former prisoners work in the East Bay School system to teach the skills that help prevent crime.

Based on an examination of early discourses found in the Buddhist Pali Canon, this class explored the question: "What did the Buddha teach that was distinctively and originally his own?" By differentiating the Buddha's Dhamma from the ideas of Indian religion and metaphysics that prevailed at his time this class sought to uncover a clearer sense of the Buddha's message and then considered what relevance it still has for people living in the modern world. The day was divided between talks, sitting meditation and discussion.

Stephen Batchelor was a Buddhist monk in the Tibetan and Korean Zen traditions. Known for his secular and agnostic approach, he teaches Buddhist meditation and philosophy worldwide. Author of the bestselling Buddhism without Beliefs, his most recent publication is Confession of a Buddhist Atheist.

This class offered an in-depth study of an important discourse by the Buddha. In a dramatic narrative context, a king asks the Buddha about what benefits come from the religious life. The Buddha responds by describing the stages of Buddhist practice. The sutta is the second discourse in Long Discourses.

Beginning with an overview of the teachings on nibbana, Ajahn Amaro elaborated on definitions the teachings of 'non-self'. The afternoon addressed the essential themes of attending to the deathless, unsupported consciousness and the unconditioned and non-locality. He then discussed applications of the teachings to the Gradual Path, stream entry and the blessings of nibbana, followed by discussion.

This daylong class introduced the basics of Pali, the language of the Buddhist teachings in the Theravada tradition. Dr. Norihisa, a scholar of Pali and Sanskrit Buddhist texts, is on a one year term as visiting research fellow at Stanford to study Sanskrit Buddhist manuscripts and early Chinese translations. Dr. Porta is a lecturer at Stanford who, in addition to Pali language and literature, teaches Sanskrit, Greek and other classical language.

The Buddha refused to state that the self exists or doesn't exist, yet he frequently used perceptions of self and not-self as skillful means in his teachings. This course, through readings, discusion, and meditation, explored the many meanings of 'self' in the Buddha's self strategies and not-self strategies for gaining freedom from clinging and suffering.

Samadhi: Exploring the Range of Teachings and Controversies on Concentration & Jhana

There is a wide range of views and opinions on the various concentration practices in Buddhism, and on how they relate to insight meditation practices. We compared different views, including controversies, and considered how these views can inform and enrich our meditation practice. The day included some meditation practice periods.

Resting in Emptiness: The Evolution and Transcendence of the Self
Rick Hanson and Rick Mendius

The Buddha taught that not-self was one of the three fundamental characteristics of existence, alongside impermanence and suffering. In this workshop, we examined self - and its release - in light of Buddhism, evolution, and modern brain science; these perspectives inform each other, and together they offer powerfully practical tools for deconstructing the apparent self.

In this workshop, we covered:

Buddhist perspectives on the interconnectedness of all things, and thus the emptiness of any apparent thing - including the personal self

Radical Dharma: The Buddha's Teachings on Views and Desire -
Verses from the Atthaka Vagga

The Atthaka Vagga (the Octet Chapter) of the Sutta Nipata contains sixteen poems on the subject of non-clinging. These teachings offer a radical and challenging approach to the liberative teachings of the Buddha, focusing most specifically on the subject of clinging to views and desire.

These verses may well contain some of the earliest teachings of the Buddha, since there are other discourses within the Pali Canon that refer to these teachings, and the language of these verses is more arachic than that of other discouses in the Pali Canon.

During this daylong, we explored this ancient text from different perspectives: as an internally consistent teaching that proposes a radical path of non-clinging, without reference to any metaphysical belief system, and as a teaching contained within the larger body of Buddhist literature, highlighting some apparent contradictions between the two, and possible ways to reconcile them.

The teachings on the Satipatthana Sutta is known in English as The Four Foundations of Mindfulness. This sutta contains the Buddha's basic set of instructions for Vipassana meditation. In it we find a step-by-step guide to Buddhist meditation that is both practical and direct. While the Satipatthana is wide ranging in its scope, it is very concise in its presentation. In this daylong class, Bhante Gunaratana discussed the various aspects of The Four Foundations of Mindfulness: Meditation on the body, on feelings or sensations, on mind states, and on mental objects.

Everyone is familiar with the image of the Buddha sitting in meditation. It is an icon which takes on the aesthetic of the culture which gave rise to it: from India to Tibet; from Japan to Southeast Asia. Most recently, we can see the influence of the Dharma in the art of the west.

The earliest Dharma images were of a wheel, an empty chair, a lotus. Later, images of the Buddha portrayed him most commonly as sitting in meditation. In Japan the dharma was inherent to the design of the tea house and in the practice of inkbrush painting. By the mid 20th century, the growing Western interest in the spirituality of the East began to influence American artists for whom pop art and abstract expressionism became a means of displaying both their understanding and practice of the dharma.

Joan DePaoli is an artist, art historian, author and lecturer, and is also a curator who, since 1970, has presented exhibitions of Buddhist art in both Thailand and the United States. The day was be devoted to reviewing how visual art has been used both to commemorate the Dharma and to facilitate its practice since the time of the Buddha. There was special attention given to the Dharma's substantial influence in contemporary modern art. In describing his own practice, 20th century artist Philip Guston said: "When you go into your studio to work, everyone is there, your friends, parents, teachers, then one by one they all leave. And when you're lucky, you do!"

The latest brain research has begun to confirm the centrail insights of the Buddha. And it's suggesting ways you can help your brain to enter deeper states of mindfulness, quiet, and concentration. Suffering, joy, and freedom all depend on what happens within your nervous system. Skillful meditation practice thus means being skillful with your own brain.

This experiential workshop — led by a psychologist and a neurologist — offered user-friendly information about your brain and many practical methods to apply it to meditation practice. No prior background with meditaiton or brain science is necessary.

Steve Armstrong presents the teachings of Sayadaw U Tejaniya, who teaches that simply being aware of our experience is not sufficient for wisdom to arise. First we must understand how to practice correctly with the right attitude. Only then will wisdom and understanding arise out of practice.

The practice itself is an awareness of mind, inquiring into our experience with such questions as: What is the attitude I am practicing with? Is there a subtle defilement operating at the moment? What do I understand about my experience? Discovering the answers to these questions allows peace and happiness to arise in your heart.

How we approach insight practice conditions what we discover. Coming to it for stress management brings one kind of result; seeking emotional intelligence and balance brings another. Buddhist insight (vipassana) practice was originally designed as a vehicle for liberation. To fulfill this potential, it helps to understand how it works as a practice of liberation.

One of the most profound teachers of insight practice in modern times was the Burmese teacher Mahasi Sayadaw. Most insight meditation taught in the world is derived from his teachings. This daylong class presented his teachings on the 'absolute view of reality' which is helpful for attaining liberation and as well as finding happiness in our busy lives. With refined knowledge of this view, we can realize for ourselves the subtle wisdom of the Buddha's liberation.

Not Two, Not Even "One": Non-Duality in Theravada and Zen Buddhism by Ajahn Amaro and Joseph Bobrow

Two teachers from the Thai Forest and Zen traditions explore the experience of non-duality in Buddhist practice and everyday life. Buddhist schools have diverse perspectives on non-duality: overlapping, complementing, and sometimes, through a playful exploration of differences, cross-fertilizing one another. A day of Dharma talks, meditation practice and dialogue.

Scouting the Terrain: Exploring Dependent Co-arising as a Guide to the Path

It stands to reason that a knowledge of the Buddha's map of the causes of suffering would give practical guidance in how to follow the path to the end of suffering. Among his most important teachings providing such guidance is that of Dependent Co-arising. By describing the conditions which give rise to suffering, Dependent Co-arising shows the way to the end of suffering. Through teachings, readings, discussion and meditation this day-long course focused on the important connections highlighted in Dependent Co-arising and their role in shaping the path of virtue, concentration, and discernment.

Buddhadasa Bhikkhu was one of the most influential Buddhist teachers in Thai history. As a forest monk he taught Buddhism as a practice of close alignment with the natural world. In this commemoration of his 100th birthday, we review his most significant contributions, the controversies that sometimes surrounded him, and how his teachings and social activism are relevant in today's West.